IT in Brief

I have spent most of my working life as a professional actor, but began to develop an interest in IT in the mid 1990s, using various Open Learning schemes to acquire familiarity with word processing packages, before enrolling on two QuarkXpress courses provided by Brighton College of Technology's Flexible Learning program. I was fortunate enough to win a place on, and EPSRC funding for, the MSc Information Systems course run by Brighton University, began my studies in September 1997 and graduated in November 1998. During the course I completed a two-month work placement at Comshare® as an Intranet developer. Since graduating, I have undertaken a freelance contract for Tynemarch Systems Engineering, digitising Ordnance Survey map data, and have undergone a six week intensive training course in Web design at fdm. I spent time as an image editor on two sites for Pelham Projects: Rudiments Of Wisdom and Hunkin's Experiments. I was employed for 15 months by Penna Resourcing Solutions to carry out online research, Help file authoring, software testing, system documentation and technical support management, and since leaving the company I have carried out some of these roles voluntarily for former colleagues there, now trading as Pengower. I am currently working part time as a freelance for Tynemarch Systems Engineering again, capturing and manipulating data on behalf of their clients, South East Water. I also designed, and maintain, this site, and the website for traditional singer, author and presenter Shirley Collins